


chasing down my lane

by Vallern



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Police, F/F, Food, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-03
Updated: 2016-11-03
Packaged: 2018-08-28 18:09:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8456575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vallern/pseuds/Vallern
Summary: Someone has been stealing Alex's food from the fridge in the break room.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jura](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jura/gifts).



> For my fave non-celeb ginger <3 Cheer up, my dude! Sorry for how shitty this is, I'll do better next time :( 
> 
> Title is from There She Goes by Sixpence None the Richer.

It's 12 PM.

  
It's 12 PM and Alex Danvers is hungry. Some says she's always hungry, but that description is more accurate for her sister, who always scarfing down food, whether she's looking for inspiration for her paintings or following CatCo's newest fixation, Lena something. Alex never really pays too much attention to powerful people.

  
It's 12 PM and she hasn't eaten since yesterday's meager dinner of vegetable soup and bread. (Which was not a proper meal. At all.) She didn't have a chance to eat breakfast because she had to listen to Kara whining about how pretty and flirtatious the Lena woman is, and because she's a good sister, she let Kara vents until 2 AM. But it did make her late, so there's that.

  
She decides to abandon her paperwork and goes outside to buy some food from the eye burning pink and green neon food truck that always parks across the street, Flambo's.

  
The line is pretty long by the time she gets there, and she has to restrain herself from flashing her badge so they'll all scatter and let her eat her goddamn food.

  
By the time it's her turn to buy, it's nearly 1.00 PM and she wanted to choke the old lady before her who took, like, 15 minutes just to decide. The food truck only has maybe three menus!

  
(She's cranky when she's hungry.)

  
She finally has her Diablo Bison Burger and sweet potato fries with a chocolate milkshake when her phone rings.

  
"Danvers."

  
She nearly drops her food and her phone when she tries to not let out the loudest 'FUCK' in her life because apparently, there's a double homicide. At her lunch time.

  
Fuck, indeeed.

 

* * *

 

She trudges back to the station at 4.30 PM with a newfound disgust at human race and a hunger she never felt before. Is this what Kara feels all the time?

  
The hunger part, she means. Kara is too sweet to be a misanthropic grouch like her.

  
She stashed her lunch in the break room fridge and she hopes to God no one touches it. She wrote down 'DANVERS' in big letters on the brown bag, but cops sometimes has worse manners than a half-starved feral child when it comes to food.

  
No one dares to look inside the break room when Alex starts kicking the fridge and cursing up a storm because _someone stole her goddamn food with her name on it._

  
She storms out off the room with a murderous expression. Someone will pay for this... this travesty!

  
"Danvers!"

  
Alex is a lot of things, but she knows when to pick her battle. So, as much as she wants to scream and run to lock herself in a fully stocked pantry, her feet takes her to the Captain's office.

  
"You want to see me, Sir?"

  
"Sit down."

  
She does with a 'humph'.

  
"I can hear your scream from the break room."

  
"Someone stole my lunch, Sir. I think it's a good reason to scream."

  
Captain Henshaw rubs his face. Alex is one of her best detective, but she will throw a tantrum if she hasn't eaten yet. Like now. The woman is practically pouting and he doesn't need to be an empath to feel rage and hunger oozing out from Alex's every pore.

  
"Here, take the rest of mine."

  
She happily accepts the offered Tupperware and fork and opens it to find a half portion of arugula salad.

  
"..."

  
"..."

  
"..."

  
"..."

  
"... thank you, Sir."

  
"You're welcome, Danvers."

  
She tries to swallow the arugula without wincing. She hates greens, mainly because her mom always tried to force-feed her vegetables, and it left a bitter taste in Alex's mouth. Sometimes literally.

  
"Danvers?"

  
She looks up and stabs the salad with more force than necessary. "Sir?"

  
"Your new partner will come soon."

  
"Really? Who is it?"

  
"She just transferred yesterday from Gotham, and now she's in HRD to do some paperwork. Her name is Maggie Sawyer."

  
"Oh. Alright."

  
She tries to not feel annoyed that a stranger will replace Lucy's place as her partner. From the way Henshaw looks at her, she fails spectacularly.

  
"Danvers. Alex. It's not your fault that Lane quits so suddenly."

  
She frowns. "I know."

  
"I think you'll get along with Detective Sawyer."

  
"We'll see."

 

* * *

 

Alex doesn't meet her new partner until the next day. She's neck deep in her paperwork about the double homicide that turns out to be a murder suicide. Sick fucker.

  
"Hey."

  
Alex looks up to see a short woman with long dark hair, tan skin, big brown eyes, and a pretty gorgeous smile in front of her desk.

  
_Wow, Danvers. This is too early for having gay thoughts._

  
"You're Danvers, right?"

  
"Yeah, who are you?"

  
"Maggie Sawyer, your new partner," she smiles and offers her hand for Alex to shake.

  
Oh.

  
"Uh, hi." She shakes the other woman's hand, not knowing what to do. Her first meeting with Lucy wasn't like this (chasing down a mugger together while off the clock was a great first impression), and her sister is the social butterfly of the family, so Alex's people skill is below average. As in none at all.

  
"You have a good handshake, Danvers."

  
"Really? That's a thing?"

  
"Yeah. You can tell what kind of people they are based on handshakes alone. Yours were strong and firm, which is always good. It showed your strength without being showy and overpowering. You didn't try to crush my hand either, so that alone put you above 99% of the people I shook hands with."

  
"Huh." Alex doesn't know what to say. She never does.

  
Besides, the woman's lips are more interesting to look at than listening to her words.

  
Wait, her lips stops moving.

  
Shit.

  
"Sorry, am I boring you?"

  
Even while frowning, the woman still looks cute. Nice.

  
_Okay, Danvers, tone down the gay and answer her._

  
"No, I'm just... distracted."

  
"By what?" She looks around in confusion, looking for anything or anyone that held Alex's attention.

  
She wants to say 'by you', but wow. Talk about making an ass of herself. So she decides to land on a safe excuse instead.

  
"By all the paperwork. Crime drama lied to me, police work is mostly 90% paperwork and 10% action. Of course they chose to show the action; who wants to see a bunch of cops grumbling about deadline?"

  
Great, now she's rambling. Fan-fucking-tastic.

  
"So you became a cop because you saw too much TV shows?" Well. At least Sawyer looks amused, so she takes it as a win.

  
"No, I became a cop because I can do some good and I can legally beat and/or shooting the shit out of people." There, that's her go-to reason. She doesn't care if it makes her sounds sociopathic or callous, she's not gonna divulge the real reason to a stranger she just met five minutes ago. No matter how pretty she is.

  
"Seems like we have a badass over here," Sawyer smirks, but her eyes are unreadable. Damn shame.

  
"What about you, Sawyer?"

  
"Well..." she sits down on the chair opposite of Alex. Lucy's old seat. Shit, she forgot to tell Sawyer to sit down. At least she did it herself, but isn't it a basic social thing to offer a seat when someone is standing? Holy hell.

  
"I became a cop because I think it's a good way to give back to the community," she stretches. Wow, look at those hips. Thank god for small shirts. Mmm. Nice.

  
_Wait, she's looking here. Eyes up._

  
"How so?"

  
"Ah, you know the story of every second generation immigrants that came to USA. Trying to give back to the community that are good to them, even if sometimes there are major assholes in the way."

  
"Oh." Now she _really_ doesn't know what to say. Also, not an appropriate time to stare creepily at her lips. "Good for you?"

  
"Is that a question?"

  
"No."

  
"Okay," she snorts. "You're kinda awkward, aren't you?"

  
"I'm not known for my social skills, no."

  
"And so self aware at that." She likes to see Sawyer's smile. It looks nice. "Hey, what do you want me to do, partner? Any case we need to crack?" Wow, her grin is even better. Sawyer obviously cares about her dental hygiene.

  
_What the hell. That was super creepy and inappropriate._

  
"Not right now, no, so uh..." she trails off. Alex was the new partner once and she and Lucy was thrown to action like five minutes after the introduction. Then they got drunk together and sang an entire Westlife album at the dive bar/karaoke joint two blocks from the station.

  
"Uh, you want to eat lunch together? I don't really have anything to do other than finishing paperwork for a murder suicide." It's just 11 AM, which is a bit too early for lunch, but what the hell.

  
"Sure, show me where to get good food, wouldn't you?"

  
"Alright, let's go."

 

* * *

 

They're going to Flambo's because it's close, cheap, and Alex missed out one of her favorite burger because some dickhead decided to steal her food with her goddamn name on it.

  
There are no line, thankfully, because it's not lunch rush yet. The bored looking blond perks up when he sees Alex approaching the truck.

  
"Hey, Danvers. You're early."

  
"Better to beat the lunch rush with," she shrugs.

  
"Who's the lady? Damn, dude, you move fast!"

  
"Shut your mouth, Dan. This is Detective Sawyer, my new partner. She just transferred from Gotham."

  
"Hey, I'm Dan. Wow, you have a terrible luck for getting this grump as your partner," he grins.

  
"Maggie Sawyer. And no, I think I'm lucky to have someone who caught the Nightingale Killer as my partner." Okay, so she read her file. Of course she would; she'd do the same if she's going to have a new partner too. But still, the mention of _that_ makes her frown.

  
"I guess so. Danvers is grumpy, but she's a damn good cop," Dan grins. "She tackled down a mugger and saved my family inheritance even before she was officially a detective." At Sawyer's puzzled gaze and Alex's eyeroll, Dan continues. "That asshole grabbed my Nan's bag which contained all the files for the will and such. If Danvers and Detective Lane weren't there..." he shakes his head.

  
"I didn't even know who she was back then. Besides, why she was the only one you called Detective? I'm a detective too, you dick."

  
"Because she's prettier and has better manners than you. Well..." he sighs. "Was prettier and had better manner."

  
Fucking Dan. He has to remind her that Lucy's gone. Alex's face darkens at the thought.

  
Sawyer looks at both of them awkwardly and clears her throat. "So, Dan! What's your recommendation? I'm hungry."

  
It's not smooth at all, but Alex glad Sawyer changed the subject. Standing there talking about her old partner with her new partner makes her uncomfortable.

  
"Well, if you're a carnivore like Danvers, we have a nice selection of burgers without the pesky vegetable thing, but if you're a normal human who eats a balanced diet, we have salad and pasta and such."

  
Finally, Alex buys an Ultima Pastrami Burger, fried mushroom, and a can of Sprite while Sawyer gets a Seitan Burger and a can of Coke.

  
"How much--"

  
Alex stops Sawyer from taking out her wallet. "Let me pay."

  
"I can pay, Danvers."

  
"Just... think about it as a 'welcome to the city' treat, I guess."

  
"Alright, but I'll pay for the next one."

  
"Sure," Alex says distractedly. Sawyer's pretty face isn't enough of a pull to tear her eyes away from food. Kind of. She might be stealing a glance or two.

  
They sit on a bench not far from Flambo's and eats their lunch in silence. It's a pretty comfortable silence, if she says so herself. Alex never mind the quiet and the lulls between conversations.

  
Turns out, Sawyer doesn't try to talk her ear off either, so it's a win-win.

Good food, sunshine, and a pretty woman besides her.

  
Today is a pretty good day.

 

* * *

 

(Un)fortunately, "next one" turns out to be a week later since Kara is over the moon for the entire week.

  
Her boss, the one with a name like a fish, approved her story and told her to chase the lead. Kara, being Kara, managed to do just that and she finally got a nod from the fish and her first story was published three days ago. Alex framed the story, cutout and all. She's proud of her baby sister.

  
Maybe not so proud of her choice of date for the celebration dinner (really, Kara, a controversial CEO? Talk about conflict of interest down the road later), but hey. Kara is a pretty good catch, and anyone would be lucky to have her. She just hopes the woman wouldn't hurt Kara, because her sister sometimes is too naive and nice for her own good.

  
A happy Kara means an active Kara. An active Kara means a cooking Kara, and her baby sister is a pretty damn good cook. The rare times Alex voluntarily eating vegetables were all because of Kara.

  
And, hey. Food is food. Food is the one thing that never disappoint Alex, especially if it's homemade and free.

  
Kara packed her lunch again this morning for the third time in the row and for the first time in weeks, she's smiling before her morning coffee.

  
(She ignores the way her colleagues' eyes widen at the sight of her smile before 10 AM. Those assholes can't mind their own business, she swears.)

  
She puts her Tupperware in the fridge, the lunch stealing incident is far from her mind.

  
When she gets back to her desk, Sawyer looks anxious and fidgety. Weird, she's usually is calmer than this. Not that Alex would know too much about her, but at least from her observation for the past week alone, Sawyer is calm and confident, if a bit cocky.

  
"What's up?"

  
"Someone found a floater near the dock, let's go."

 

* * *

 

They get back to the station around 2 PM, hungry and tired. They canvassed the area and other than the eyewitness who found the corpse, no one saw anything.

  
Now the corpse is in the morgue with the M.E, and the CSI nerds are going through the evidences.

  
Nothing to do but wait, then.

  
Maybe she could close her eyes for a bit.

  
"Danvers, wanna grab some lunch?" Sawyer's voice isn't really helping her exhaustion, but at least she reminds Alex to eat.

  
Right, Kara's food in the fridge!

  
"Sorry, Sawyer, I brought something today. Maybe tomorrow?" She opens her eyes blearily, and she swears she sees a flash of disappointment across Sawyer's face, but it must be just her hallucination.

  
"Okay, Danvers." With that, she left. Alex rubs her forehead to try to alleviate her exhaustion and heads to the break room.

  
When she opens the fridge, her Tupperware with Kara's food is nowhere to be seen.

  
What the fuck?

  
Old cans of coffee, an expired carton of milk, a moldy sandwich, and no Kara's food.

  
Her hands are twitching with anger, but she manages to stop herself from slamming the fridge door.

  
She needs to cool her head off.

 

* * *

 

She finds herself outside and she nearly crashes into Sawyer.

  
"Damn, Danvers, what's the rush?"

  
"Someone stole my food," she growls.

  
"Seriously? Who the hell did that kind of thing?"

  
"I don't know, but I'm hungry and I'm ready to kill someone if I don't have food in my stomach in the next five minutes."

  
"Whoa, big girl, calm down. Let me buy you lunch, besides I still owe you for the last week."

  
Alex frowns. "You don't owe me anything. It's just a courtesy."

  
"Sure, but I want to. Come on, Danvers. Flambo's is calling."

  
Damn it, she can't possibly protect herself from the deadly combo of Flambo's food and Sawyer's smile.

  
Ugh.

  
Fine.

  
"Fine."

  
Sawyer's eyes brightens considerably and she smiles wider.

  
Alex internally pats herself on the back for making Sawyer smile.

 

* * *

 

Okay, so the station officially has a food thief among them.

  
Alex's lunch disappears again.

  
Her Kara food is gone without trails. Poof. Nothing, not even her Tupperware.

  
She wants to interrogate everyone one by one, but Henshaw probably would chew her out if she does that. Damn it.

  
Sawyer raises an eyebrow when she sees Alex storms out of the break room with a murderous expression.

  
"What's wrong, Danvers?"

  
"Food. Gone. Again," Alex whispers. She misses Kara's food. Her sister took the time to go to her apartment to make her food, and some assholes thought it was funny to steal it.

  
"Want me to ask around? Seriously, this is childish as hell."

  
"... no," she buries her face in her palm.

  
"Aw, Danvers, don't pout. I'll buy you cookies."

  
"I don't like sweet things."

  
"Fine, a burger as big as your fist."

  
Alex looks up at that.

  
"With as many fries as you want."

  
Alex definitely isn't drooling.

 

* * *

 

Sawyer is in the middle of telling an amusing story about a delusional billionaire with bat fetish back in Gotham when their phones are buzzing with incoming texts.

  
"Huh. It looks like the floater fell off because he was drunk, according to the stomach content," Alex mutters.

  
"Poor bastard."

  
"Right?"

  
She reaches for the last piece of fries when Sawyer takes it from between her fingers.

  
Alex blinks.

  
"Hey!"

  
"Sorry." Alex kind of want to punch Sawyer's smirk. With her mouth.

  
_You're so gay, Danvers. Too gay. How do you even function?_

  
"What's with people around me who likes to steal my food? The asshole who stole my lunch, Kara, you..."

  
"Kara?" Sawyer frowns.

  
"My sister."

  
"Ah. Are you guys close?"

  
"Very. So I'm pissed someone stole my lunch because my baby sister took the time to cook for me but some asshole just took it without any consideration," she huffs. "At the very least, they could've brought the Tupperware back. It's my mom's."

  
Sawyer is quiet for a moment, and Alex chews her burger.

  
They spend the rest of the lunch in silence.

 

* * *

 

Right before Alex is going home for the day, there are two plastic boxes on her desk with a note that says 'SORRY :(' on it.

What the hell?

Her mind whirls and then it clicks.

  
Sawyer.

  
Sawyer is the one that has been stealing her food.

  
But for what? In the end she ends up buying Alex lunch, anyway.

  
Unless...

  
Unless that's what she wants? Buying Alex lunch?

  
Pft, yeah, right.

  
How about the burger back before they even met?

  
Well, only one way to find out.

 

* * *

  
She's waiting for Sawyer at their shared desk, and since her jacket is still draped on the chair, she knows that Sawyer is still somewhere in the building.

  
Right on cue, Sawyer comes out of the bathroom.

  
"Hey, Danvers."

  
"Sawyer. Did you steal my food?"

  
Direct and blunt. Both combination always makes people surprised, even Sawyer.

  
"What?"

  
"You heard me. Yes or no?"

  
Sawyer opens her mouth before closing it again in a click.

  
"Yes."

  
Alex narrows her eyes. "Why?"

  
Sawyer shrugs and Alex wants to throw something at her.

  
"How about my burger when we haven't met each other yet?!"

  
"I was hungry and I saw your food in the fridge with your name, and I thought, 'well, that's Alex's Danvers' food' and I just took it without thinking."

  
"Are you some kind of klepto? Geez, Sawyer."

  
"Guess I just want to eat lunch with you, Danvers."

  
Alex squints at her. "Why?"

  
"Why not? You're my partner."

  
She scowls and glares at Sawyer.

  
"Next time, if you want my attention, just ask."

  
Sawyer beams and Alex tries to ignore the fluttering in her stomach.

**Author's Note:**

> I took the Nightingale Killer bit from the TV show Frequency. It's a pretty good show, and this is coming from a non sci-fi/crime drama fan.
> 
> All the food mentioned were taken from the Eat Street website.
> 
> This is kind of a long way to basically just have Maggie stealing Alex's food for fun... what the hell. That's what not eating and sleeping properly for five days do to me, plus drinking three cups of coffee in an hour. A messy fic :/ oh well.


End file.
